1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates, generally, to an electroluminescent element and an electronic device including the same, and more particularly, to an electroluminescent element, which comprises a glass template having a silica layer as a matrix, electrodes and a luminescent material, and an electronic device including the electroluminescent element.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the advancement of information and communication technologies in recent years, the demand for optical products having high functionality and high efficiency is increasing tremendously. The development of a luminescent element has progressed rapidly since the 1990s.
The luminescent element may be applied to various optical products, such as displays (e.g., flat panel displays), screens (e.g., computer screens), and medical apparatuses requiring illumination. Thus, high luminance, low operating voltage and high efficiency of the luminescent element are regarded as important factors that determine the quality of these products.
Recently, thorough research into quantum dot displays has been carried out to increase luminous efficiency. The quantum dot display is based on a light emission technique using a tunneling effect through the formation of semiconductor quantum dots having a size of ones of nanometers, in which light emitting diodes being nanometer sized are densely distributed to emit light therefrom, resulting in drastically improved luminous efficiency. However, a considerable part of the light emitted from the luminescent layer is reflected on the surface of the substrate or electrode and is thus captured in the element, undesirably decreasing the amount of emitted light.
Further, research into methods of increasing luminous efficiency using nanowires is being conducted, in which nanowires are linear material having a diameter on the nanometer scale (e.g., 1 nm=10−9 m) and a length much greater than the diameter, for example, on hundreds of nanometers, micrometer (e.g., 1 μm=10−6 m) or millimeter (e.g., 1 mm=10−3 m) scale.
The nanowires may be variously applied to minute devices due to their small size, and are advantageous because they exhibit optical properties of polarization or electron shift in a predetermined direction.
Specifically, the nanowires having electron shift properties may be applied to a nano electronic device such as a multiple single electron transistor (“multi-SET”), and the nanowires having optical properties may be applied to an optical transmission line, a nano anaylzer, or a nano signal sensor used for the diagnosis of cancer, using a surface plasmon polarition mode.
Typically, methods of manufacturing nanowires include, for example, chemical vapor deposition (“CVD”), laser ablation and a template process.
According to the template process, among the above-mentioned processes, pores having a size ranging from ones of nanometers to hundreds of nanometers are formed, and such a pore is used as a nanowire template. For instance, the template process includes oxidizing an aluminum electrode to form aluminum oxide on the surface thereof, electrochemically etching the aluminum oxide to form a template having nanopores, dipping the aluminum electrode into a solution containing metal ions, applying a voltage to stack the metal ions on the aluminum electrode through pores so that the pores are filled with the metal ions, and then removing the oxide using an appropriate process, thus obtaining metal nanowires alone.
With regard to the method of manufacturing nanowires using a template, a method of manufacturing nanowires by forming a catalytic film on a substrate, forming a porous layer on the film, and forming titanium nanowires in pores through heat treatment has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,525,461.
In addition, a method of manufacturing a quantum dot solid using a template comprising introducing colloidal nanocrystals into pores formed in the template to form the quantum dot solid through heat treatment, has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,139,626.
However, such conventional nanowire-manufacturing methods are disadvantageous because they require a long manufacturing time and thus are unsuitable for mass production. As well, in the case of the electroluminescent element using nanowires, it is difficult to ensure linearity of the grown nanowires, and spaces between the nanowires are filled with another material to form an electrode, leading to a complicated manufacturing process.